Charity and Good Works (pt. 53)

Selection from True Christian Religion ~ Emanuel Swedenborg
Charity and Good Works (pt. 53)
v Doctrinal Series v

XVI. THERE IS SPURIOUS CHARITY, HYPOCRITICAL CHARITY, AND DEAD CHARITY

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Dead charity is the charity of those whose faith is dead; since the charity is such as the faith is. ... That the faith of those who are without works is dead, appears from the Epistle of James (2:17, 20).

Furthermore, faith is dead in those who do not believe in God; but believe in living and dead men, and who worship images as holy in themselves, as the gentiles formerly did. The offerings of those who are in such a faith, which for the sake of salvation they bestow upon their miracle-working images, as they call them, including these offerings among works of charity, are precisely like the gold and silver that are put in the urns and monuments of the dead; they are even like the meat given to Cerberus, or the fee paid to Charon for ferriage to the Elysian fields.

But the charity of those who believe that there is no God, but only nature instead, is neither spurious, hypocritical, nor dead; it is no charity at all, because it is not joined to any faith, and cannot be called charity, since the quality of charity is determined by faith. Such charity, viewed from heaven, is like bread made of ashes, a cake made of fishes' scales, or fruit made of wax.

(True Christian Religion 453)

To be continued . . .

Charity and Good Works (pt. 52)

Selection from True Christian Religion ~ Emanuel Swedenborg
Charity and Good Works (pt. 52)
v Doctrinal Series v

XVI. THERE IS SPURIOUS CHARITY, HYPOCRITICAL CHARITY, AND DEAD CHARITY

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Hypocritical charity is the charity of those who in their churches and private dwellings humble themselves almost to the floor before God, devoutly pour forth long prayers, put on a holy expression of countenance, kiss images of the cross and the bones of the dead, and kneel beside sepulchres and there with their mouths mutter words of holy veneration for God, and yet in their heart they are thinking of being themselves worshiped and seeking to be adored as divinities. It is such as these whom the Lord describes in the following words:

When thou doest alms, sound not a trumpet before thee, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may have glory of men. And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites, who love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men (Matt. 6:2, 5).

Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For ye shut up the kingdom of heaven before men; for ye enter not in yourselves, neither do ye suffer those to enter who wish to enter. Woe unto you, hypocrites! For ye compass sea and land to make one proselyte and when he is made, ye make him twofold more a son of hell than yourselves. Woe unto you, hypocrites! For ye make clean the outside of the cup and of the platter, but within they are filled with extortion and excess (Matt. 23:13, 15, 25).

Well hath Isaiah prophesied of you, hypocrites, saying, This people honoreth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me (Mark 7:6).

Woe unto you, hypocrites! For ye are as graves which appear not, and the men that walk over them know it not (Luke 11:44).

Beside other passages. Such are like flesh without blood, like crows and parrots taught to repeat the words of a psalm, and like birds taught to sing the tune of a sacred hymn; and the sound of their voice is like that of a bird-catcher's whistle.

(True Christian Religion 452)

To be continued . . .

Charity and Good Works (pt. 51)

Selection from True Christian Religion ~ Emanuel Swedenborg
Charity and Good Works (pt. 51)
v Doctrinal Series v

XVI. THERE IS SPURIOUS CHARITY, HYPOCRITICAL CHARITY, AND DEAD CHARITY

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All charity that is not conjoined with faith in one God in whom is a Divine trinity, is spurious like the charity of the present church — the faith of which is a faith in successive order in three persons of the same Divinity, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit; and being a faith in three persons, each one of whom is a self-subsistent God, it is a faith in three Gods. To such a faith charity may be joined (as has been done by its supporters), but never can be conjoined; and the charity that is only joined to faith is merely natural, and not spiritual, and is therefore a spurious charity.

The same is true of the charity of many other heresies, as the charity of those who deny a Divine trinity and thus approach God the Father only, or the Holy Spirit only, or both of these apart from God the Savior. To the faith of such, charity cannot be conjoined, or when conjoined or joined to it it is a spurious charity. It is called spurious, because it is like the offspring of an illegitimate bed, or like the son of Hagar born to Abraham, who was cast out of the house (Gen. 21:10).

Such charity is like fruit upon a tree where it has not grown, but has been fastened to it with a needle; and it is like a carriage to which horses are fastened only by the reins in the driver's hands, and when they spring forward, they drag the driver from his seat, and leave the carriage behind.

(True Christian Religion 451)

To be continued . . .